Sex offender punished in Montco

A largely unrepentant sex crimes offender who met his victims while selling used computers and Pokemon cards at a Richland Township flea market was sentenced to 50 to 100 years in prison Wednesday.

"I know that I like little boys," Sylvan Hemingway told Montgomery County Judge William Nicholas minutes before the judge handed down the sentence. "I admit that. What can I say?"

Hemingway, of Abington, did say briefly that he wanted it known to his victims, who were not at his sentencing hearing Wednesday, that he was sorry. But he spent most of a rambling 45-minute address to Nicholas talking about all the good things he had done for one of his victims, a teenage boy.

Hemingway said he had taken the boy to the Smithsonian Institution and tutored him. "I wanted someone to pass my knowledge on to," he said. "He learned about American history, he learned about space flight. Whatever you do to me, that will never leave him. That is my legacy."

Hemingway had pleaded guilty to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse, corruption of minors and other crimes in November. Another defendant in the child sex ring, Wayne Allen Miller, 41, of Abington, was sentenced in Montgomery County Court on Wednesday to 17 to 42 years in prison. The judges said Hemingway and Miller -- who both had a history of sex crimes -- were likely to molest again if they're ever released from prison.

Hemingway told Nicholas on Wednesday that Miller was his half-brother but said he had no documentation or even any relatives left to back it up. Nicholas said Hemingway's revelation would have no impact on the sentence. Hemingway also told the judge that one of the boys was the aggressor -- "he made an offer and I accepted," he said -- and criticized the parents of one of his victims for not providing a better home. "The only way I could describe it, your honor, is Tobacco Road," he said. "He was only allowed to have one bath a week."

Nicholas interrupted him, asking, "Do you think any of these things mitigate what you did?"

Miller, who pleaded guilty to involuntary deviate sexual intercourse and other charges last year, asked to be paroled to a place where no one is under 18. "If there is anywhere" like that, he told Judge Gerald Corso, "let me know."

Nicholas said from the bench that Hemingway had a similar inability to control his urges. "Taking kids to the Smithsonian Institution doesn't begin to justify abusing them sexually and depriving them of their innocence," Nicholas said. "Your insights remain nil with respect to your circumstances."

The third defendant in the ring, Emmanuel Newman, 38, of Wyncote, was sentenced to 25 to 50 years in prison in December.

All there were accused of having sex with and taking pornographic videos of three boys ages 14 to 16.

The victims were from Richland Township, Bedminster Township and the Lancaster area. They had told authorities they met Hemingway in 2000 at the Quakertown Farmers Market. The Richland and Bedminster boys said they began sleeping over at Hemingway's apartment soon after meeting him.